1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an intaglio printing press.
2. Description of the Related Art
An intaglio printing press is configured as shown in FIG. 12 and functions as follows. A sheet feeder 10 feeds a sheet 1 onto a sheet feeder table 21. A swing arm shaft pregripper 22 transfers the sheet 1 to a transfer cylinder 23. The sheet 1 is then transferred to an impression cylinder 31 via a transfer cylinder 24. Ink fountain units 34a to 34d feed ink to an intaglio cylinder 32 via ink form rollers 33a to 33d, respectively. A wiping roller 37 removes excess ink from the intaglio cylinder 32, and then ink is transferred to the sheet 1 held on the impression cylinder 31 to thereby perform multicolor printing (4-color printing) on the sheet 1. Subsequently, the sheet 1 is transferred from the impression cylinder 31 to a delivery cylinder 41. The sheet 1 undergoes gripping change from the delivery cylinder 41 to a gripper bar of a chain 44. The sheet 1 is transported on the chain 44 as the chain 44 is run by means of rotation of sprockets 42 and 43. The thus-printed sheets 1 are delivered onto delivery units 45. (Refer to, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open (kokai) No. 2001-096722).
In such an intaglio printing press, as many ink fountain units and ink form rollers as possible; specifically, four ink fountain units 34a to 34d and four ink form rollers 33a to 33d, are disposed around the intaglio cylinder 32 to perform printing in as many colors as possible; specifically, in four colors. Notably, multicolor printing (4-color printing) making use of all of the ink fountain units 34a to 34d and the ink form rollers 33a to 33d is not performed very frequently. In most cases, ordinary printing (3-color printing) is performed by use of, for example, the ink fountain units 34a to 34c among the ink fountain units 34a to 34d, and the ink form rollers 33a to 33c among the ink form rollers 33a to 33d. 
In the above-mentioned intaglio printing press, excess ink to be removed from the intaglio cylinder 32 by means of the wiping roller 37 is of a relatively large amount. Thus, a wiping liquid, contained in a wiping tank 38, used to clean the wiping roller 37 becomes unclean in a relatively short period of time, thereby increasing the frequency of replacing the wiping liquid, the frequency of regenerating the wiping liquid, or the frequency of a like operation. A conceivable measure to cope with the problem is to provide a pre-wiping unit upstream of the wiping roller 37 with respect to the rotational direction of the intaglio cylinder 32 to scrape most of excess ink from the intaglio cylinder 32, thereby slowing down contamination of the wiping liquid and thus reducing the frequency of replacing the wiping liquid, the frequency of regenerating the wiping liquid, or the frequency of a like operation.
However, since as many ink fountain units and ink form rollers as possible; specifically, the ink fountain units 34a to 34d and the ink form rollers 33a to 33d, are disposed around the intaglio cylinder 32, a space for disposing the pre-wiping unit is not available around the intaglio cylinder 32. In order to dispose the pre-wiping unit, the ink fountain unit 34d and the ink form roller 33d, which are the ink fountain unit and the ink form roller located furthest downstream with respect to the rotational direction of the intaglio cylinder 32, must be removed.
Thus, when a user is to purchase an intaglio printing press, the user has no other choice but to select either an intaglio printing press that performs ordinary printing (3-color printing) with pre-wiping, or an intaglio printing press that performs multicolor printing (4-color printing) without pre-wiping.